


Love, Loss and What We Didn't Wear

by fictorium



Category: Battlestar Galactica (2003), Damages
Genre: F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-01-31
Updated: 2010-01-31
Packaged: 2017-10-06 21:27:14
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 809
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/57930
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fictorium/pseuds/fictorium
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A chance meeting in New York with a woman who's like nobody Patty has ever met before.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Love, Loss and What We Didn't Wear

"I don't really know how I came to be here."

Those were the first words Laura spoke to her that evening, and Patty has had a hard time getting them out of her head. Her fourth glass of Scotch has barely dented her ever-lucid and overactive consciousness. Tonight she seeks oblivion, a word that's been preying on her mind since the woman with the amazing hair and sad eyes came into her life.

Laura lay asleep in Patty's luxurious bed, clinging on to a pillow as though the comfort might be snatched away at any moment. Between sips of her fiery amber drink, Patty heard murmurs from her sleeping lover's lips, words that make no sense in the land of the waking, something that might be 'cyclone' but she didn't really want to know.

Her thoughts were already overrun with Ellen and Tom and avoiding the fact that Phil is never coming home again. So why not tell it all to go to hell and live in the moment for once?

Especially moments like the casual meeting of lips at the end of the evening. An impulsive trip to a gallery, the only other patron now the occupant of her bed.

Patty hadn't done _this_ since law school, but she hasn't lost her appreciation for other women, despite the years that have passed.

There was desperation in that second kiss, and despite her well-known face and the gossipy village culture of SoHo, she tumbled into her town car with a stranger and let the rumor mill be damned.

She didn't ask Laura where else she needed to be, and Laura didn't question why someone she just met would take her home after a few quiet minutes of conversation. All Patty could really remember thinking was "damn, those _legs_."

Laura's fingers didn't disappoint, from the methodical release of the buttons on Patty's silk blouse to the point where they were stroking rhythmically inside her. How long had it been since someone touched her that way? Such patient skill, responding expertly to every little gasp until Patty was hurtling into orgasm, shaking as she held on to Laura.

Patty couldn't quite suppress her competitive streak, undressing Laura with ease and a wicked grin. Her first real smile in weeks, it seemed. They kissed softly, the need for tenderness silently spelled out, a little solace amongst the high thread-count sheets.

Her mouth had long since been her greatest asset, Patty knew. The expressions of cold fury, the carefully chosen _bon mot_ that could draw both judge and jury into the palm of her hand, the deceptively sweet remarks that lulled friend and foe alike into a false sense of security. Tonight, she hadn't wanted to talk. Tonight she had put lips and tongue to better use, teasing her way down Laura's body with kisses and tiny bites that drew exquisite moans from her lover.

As Laura had parted her legs (and _God_ she wasn't sure she'd ever get over those legs) Patty devoted herself to drawing out every last second of sensation. Unfamiliar though the taste of another woman was to her now, Patty poured her efforts into giving Laura everything she missed about this kind of intimacy. The rapturous response from her lover left Patty feeling as proud, as invigorated as her best day in court.

Two hours later, Patty had retreated to the broad windowsill of her bedroom, watching Laura sleep in the halogen haze of New York that's spilling in through the window. It's never truly dark here, and she's always liked that.

She lit a cigarette, another indulgence that she swore to kick during her marriage, but the emergency carton of ten has been nestled in her closet for unusual occasions like this. The Marlboro Light was acrid, an affront to her taste buds, but Patty drew her robe around her and finished it anyway.

Sleep would come eventually, that much she already knew. A few snatched hours before sunrise, before the demands of the firm with its echoing corridors and ringing telephones. Patty prolonged her return to the sanctuary of cotton and Laura's warmth, sadly confident that surrendering to slumber would simply mean and empty space beside her in the morning.

For a moment, she wondered how pleasant the alternative might be: waking up in someone's arms again, the shock of red hair on the pillow next to her own pale blonde. How might it feel to kiss someone good morning and _want_ to stay in bed?

In the end, she was right; wasn't she always? The alarm clock woke her to discover torrential rain against the windows and nobody at her side. She dropped her head back against the pillow, sighing at the newest loss, trying it on like a little black dress.

Some things, you could get used to, whether you wanted to or not.


End file.
